Топик: Knowledge, Innovation and Development

The KID

Written by: Kuropatkina Serafima

Saint-Petersburg

1998

Ó Kuropatkina S.N.

1. Moving into the future

Knowledge is the thing that makes a difference. It is matter of being better informed than the others, getting ideas before the others, - these are the things that allow some companies to take off and remain leaders for a long time. In the past knowledge and innovations didn't play an important role in company management. The impact of these factors on the competition wasn't very big and obvious. From the second half of 19th century industries and management started to develop rapidly and by the end of 20th century inventions have penetrated all spheres of production, business and human life in general. Competition has dramatically increased, creating the necessity for each company to improve and develop constantly. We are moving into the future where it is not possible to win the game using traditional methods. This proves a need of a separate structure within each company that would deal with existing knowledge, innovative ideas, development of production process and working life. It is essential to design a completely new department. Let’s call it - the department of Knowledge, Innovation and Development (KID). This system also will allow the company to avoid high opportunity costs of not doing some improvements which could reduce costs and give rise to profits. Let's take a close look on the KID department, its functions and structure.

2. The department of Knowledge, Innovation and Development (KID)

2.1 KID's functions

The general functions of the KID are:

· to solve different problems that come up in a company using known methods or new ideas of the employees;

· to constantly develop company's production cycle and products

· to give aid to all departments concerning possible improvement and elimination of drawbacks

In order to fulfill its general functions KID will carry out the following subfunctions:

· receiving fresh ideas or problems from staff of different departments

· selecting the most useful and relevant ideas and checking the existence of the problem

· developing ideas and problem solutions (if needed) to level required for implementation

· making the final decision in cooperation with the department(s) involved

· implementing the developed idea

· controlling the implementation process, altering if necessary

· evaluating the outcome, calculating financial results

· rewarding the idea maker

· changing the corporate culture and working environment towards creativity and innovation values.

2.2 Structure of the KID department

In correspondence with its main activities the KID should consist of the following departments:

1) gathering and filtering department (organizes research, selects ideas, checks the relevance of problems, responds to idea proposers and customers)

2) developing department (works out solutions to problems pointed out by employees or customers, invites authors of good ideas for closer cooperation)

3) executive department (plans, runs, controls implementation process, negotiates with other departments)

4) social relations department (deals with motivation, awards, customer relations and different social activities)

At first the department 2) should closely cooperate with present R&D. In the future R&D can become subject to 2).

3. How to create a KID?

Creation of KID must be supported on the highest level of management. Without this nothing can happen.

3.1 Preliminary activities

First we must analyze how innovative is the company. How often changes take place. Who proposes them. How do workers feel about sharing the ideas. Do their ideas get attention? This will show the present situation and allow us to estimate the how much time and resources KID creation will take.

Next step is to introduce to everyone in the company the new department, to explain its purpose and functions, to show how the company and every single employee will benefit from it.

Then allocate the people and resources and create the department itself. For the beginning KID can be formed with existing managers and experts. But when many companies are going to be using similar systems they will need specially trained workers. Faculties should be designed in universities and colleges teaching students to deal with new ideas and to use existing theories and experience of preceding generations in order to solve problems and develop their company.

3.2 Designing information flows

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